Black Holes and Thunder Storms
by downbutnotout
Summary: Amy is fading, Karma is shining.
1. One: Black Holes

_I feel sick - so empty, so ordinary - 'cause in my head I heard you call my name. I'm breaking down, I'm fading._

_Fading / Basement_

**Black Holes**

Amy always thought black holes were cool because they sucked things in and no one ever knew where they went. She liked to imagine alternate universes with gashes in the sky spitting out stolen energy and matter. She liked to think of black holes like the hole Alice fell into in Alice in Wonderland. There were adventures in them, fantastic places and characters. She romanticized them as being interesting, tragically beautiful.

But there was nothing beautiful about them – only tragic – because the thing about black holes is that no matter where everything goes, it's gone.

The black hole inside of Amy formed the moment she and Karma agreed to be fake girlfriends because ever since then she had been losing herself, piece by piece. Every kiss and every touch that made her head spin spun her out her own body. She was pretending to pretend to be something she might or might not be and it left her wondering who she really was.

What she did know was when she was around Karma, she felt warm as summer. She felt like lavender and stars. But she wasn't sure what the root of that was, if she was straight and the act was starting to feel too real, if she was honestly truly madly in love with Karma, or if it was nothing more than friendship of the very best kind.

But if either of the first two possibilities were correct, Karma wasn't good for her. If truth and clarity were light Karma was the root of the blackness.

After all, Karma was the reason for the layers of deceit, and those layers didn't fit perfectly together; they were lovers who should never have been together and only acknowledged that discontinuity in retrospect. From the cracks between these layers sprang the blackness. Amy was having trouble keeping it at bay, because she didn't have the tools to fight it. What's a warrior who doesn't know what she stands for?

It made her feel small, so small compared to the infinity of space. She felt like any answers she could have were out of reach, light years away in the head or heart of someone else. Still, she couldn't stop screaming, hoping they would take pity on her and give her some meaning. But for all her noise no one heard. The universe left her alone and collapsing, imploding. She was fading and disappearing and there was no one to help.

See, if black holes swallow matter, her black hole was stealing her identity. If she was Alice, there was no Wonderland on the other side.

The thing about black holes is that they exist to destroy.


	2. Two: Thunder Storms

___Understand that if you're cold I'll keep you warm, a__nd besides, t__here's so much beauty in a storm. __So tell me, what is there to fear?__  
_

_Fall Down, Never Get Back Up Again / La Dispute_

**Thunder Storms**

People tended to think she was ditzy just because she had aspirations, goals.

But she wasn't ditzy, just dauntless. When Karma was young and watching Disney movies, she wanted to be both the saved and the savior. She wanted a prince to carry her away on a white horse, but she didn't want their destination to be just a castle – she wanted New York City, Los Angeles, her name in newspapers and lights.

She wanted to be as loud as the wind, the way it rushed through trees and city streets. She wanted to be everywhere at once, to have the entire world feel her influence. She wanted to churn windmills, create energy in the world. She wanted to invigorate people and change them, make them better than they were before.

She wanted to be as fearless as the rain, hurtling headfirst towards Earth without hesitation. She wanted to experience all she could in life. She wanted to never be afraid of anything, even the way she sometimes doubted herself.

Because sometimes even storms falter. There are lulls in the precipitation and pauses in the sounds. For a moment, you can see the sky and the storm seems finished.

Sometimes, for a moment, Karma faltered, lulled, paused. People doubted her, constantly, even her beloved best friend Amy. And sometimes, for a moment, she let their doubts get inside her head.

Lots of people had big dreams and lots of people never accomplished them. There were thousands of hungry artists and writers and leaders of movements that never took off left alone and penniless. There were thousands of people who dreamt just as big as her but ended up on the streets, dropped by their storms like soggy trash on the sidewalk.

And then there were those people in perfect suburbs with two perfect children and a perfect golden retriever. They never had storms, just constant daylight troubled only by occasional wisps of barely gray clouds. Boring, mundane. Regardless of whether they were happy or not, Karma didn't want their lives, either.

She wanted to make her own way.

And that's how she kicked the doubt, kept it from staying for more than a moment. That was how she restarted her winds and refreshed her passion. She wasn't nothing and she wasn't average. Her necessity to be someone was absolute and uncompromising and no doubts could ever stop her.

She wanted to be lightning in the dark.

She wanted to be thunder at 2 AM.

She'd get what she wanted if she died trying.


End file.
